Residents of the Kursk region refuse to evacuate due to fears. They are afraid not of the advancing Ukrainian army, but of their home being robbed by Russian soldiers. In the Glushkovsky district of the Kursk region, cut off from the main forces after the destruction of all 1/7
three bridges across the Seim River, Russian soldiers are looting houses and shops. When local residents contact the police, they are told that this cannot be. The authorities say that this is being done by Ukrainian soldiers dressed as Russians. It turns out that those who 2/7
should, in theory, protect the citizens of their country are the main danger to them. In addition to looting, Russian soldiers, frightened by the approach of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and reports of sabotage and reconnaissance groups, are starting to shoot at everything 3/7
that moves, and there have been cases of shooting at civilians. Experiencing a shortage of manpower to maintain order, people's territorial defense squads are being created. However, handing out weapons to people from the street also turned out to be a bad idea, and such 4/7
squads began to terrorize Russian volunteers. Panic, hysteria, unprofessionalism and chaotic throwing - this is how the territorial defense is described in Z publics. Thus, the territorial defense stopped a volunteer girl and under the pretext of suspicion that she was a 5/7
Ukrainian sniper, they undressed her and "searched" her. They could not explain how a Ukrainian sniper could end up in the deep Russian rear distributing packages to Russian soldiers. A Russian soldier is a threat to everything he approaches. With a weapon in his hands and 6/7
without any moral compass, with a desire for easy money and a lack of responsibility for his actions, such a soldier poses a threat to all living things around. It is not surprising that the residents of the Kursk region sometimes greet the Armed Forces of Ukraine with joy 7/7
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Russia has once again staged a media stunt with the story about a drone attack on Putin’s residence. In the Novgorod region no one heard air raid sirens, yet according to Lavrov, 91 drones were launched from Ukraine and all of
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them were shot down. There is not a single video and not a single piece of evidence. Why is this needed? This entire performance was staged specifically for Trump. Putin personally called the American president and told him about it. Russia has long convinced Trump that it
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is Zelensky together with the “warmongering shadow government of Europe” who allegedly do not want the war to end. This show was played out so that Ukraine would be blamed for the failure of peace talks. Unfortunately, with Trump, this works. Meanwhile, Lavrov declares that
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Daily strikes by Ukrainian drones and missiles on Russian oil depots, warehouses and refineries have created an image in the information space of a “leaky” Russian air defense system. This image sharply contrasts with what Russian propaganda had been instilling in its audience🧵
for decades, namely the idea of an “impenetrable shield” capable, according to Defense Minister Andrey Belousov, of intercepting up to 97 percent of targets. The reality of a full scale war has proven far more complex. Ukraine has not managed to destroy Russian air defense as a
single integrated system, but it has succeeded in exposing its real limits. As analysis by the Royal United Services Institute shows, the strength of Russian air defense depends not only on missiles and radars, but also on industry, logistics and the ability to replenish losses
Seven German journalism students tracked Russian-crewed freighters lurking off the Dutch and German coast and connected them to drone swarms over military bases. Using public tracking tools, their own drones and even driving 2500 kilometers while following a ship, they produced🧵
a far more coherent picture of the Germany and Netherlands drone mystery than months of official hand-wringing and coordinated stonewalling. “Our trail leads to Russia,” the team concludes. “Not beyond doubt, but it’s currently the most probable explanation. We systematically
laid both things side by side: the secret reports about drone incidents and the routes of the ships. You can at least recognize a pattern.” They did not find a drone on any ship and they cannot prove causation, but they established the following: ships with Russian crews showed
Brussels has found a way to make decisions on blocking Russian assets without the consent of all EU member states, the Financial Times reports. This would allow the assets to be frozen indefinitely rather than having the blockade renewed every six months as is currently 1/9
the case. According to the publication, this is made possible by one of the EU treaty provisions stating that unanimous approval is not required in situations of economic shocks, which Brussels considers the war in Ukraine to be. Until now, when extending the freeze, there 2/9
was a risk that one EU country, for example Hungary, could oppose it, and without unanimous agreement the assets would be unfrozen. In early December, the European Commission approved two options for financing Ukraine for 2026 and 2027. The first plan involves providing 3/9
Russia is laying the groundwork to make the 1990s look like a walk in the park. Everyone says Russia is returning to the nineties, but what does that mean? The collapse of the Soviet Union was driven by many factors. Economic problems had already begun in the 1970s. The USSR
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economy was built on the export of energy resources (oil and gas), metals, timber and grain. Most of the revenue went into the arms race of the Cold War. This is very similar to Russia today, whose military budget has reached record levels. The 1973 oil crisis initially
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worked in the USSR's favor by increasing export revenues, but soon an event occurred that had a greater impact on the crisis of the 1990s than anything else - the war in Afghanistan. Although the Soviet Union spent about $20 billion on the war, this was negligible compared
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US-Russia negotiations will not lead to peace. Diplomacy with Russia does not work and this truth is something the Trump administration refuses to see. The more we learn about the details of the US-Russia deal on Ukraine, the clearer it becomes that this administration 1/9
is pursuing only personal gain, both in the form of stakes in Russian business and in the form of a share of the frozen Russian assets whose unfreezing after a peace deal the US administration insists on. Russia is not striving for any peace and has never done so - this is 2/9
obvious to anyone who truly understands the issue. Russia uses the same old Soviet negotiation tactics that Kaja Kallas described when she quoted Andrei Gromyko. Three things: first demand the maximum. Do not ask but demand something that has never been yours. Secondly, 3/9